Wednesday, July 27, 2016

Random Musings & Thoughts 7/27/16

I managed to get a couple really good nights of sleep last
week in between working overtime and only getting 2 or 3 hours of sleep on my
overtime days. The days in between I got 6.5 hours and 7 hours,
respectively. And I didn’t even have to take a sleeping pill! Both
times I slept straight through and didn’t wake up once, not even to go to the
bathroom! Because of the sleeping in until 7:30am on those 2 days last
week to make sure I did get a little more sleep, I didn’t get as many strength
training sessions as I wanted. I got a whopping ONE, in fact.
Normally I like to do 2-3 sessions per week. Now, I did go to the gym 3
times, but one time all I did was do my swim (that was Sunday and I just wasn’t
feeling it) and the other time I just had time to do my run as my time
management skills leave a little to be desired at times.

All 3 shifts of overtime I worked last week, I walked and
walked and walked and did my body weight exercises. One day I did leg
lifts, another day I did Bavarian split squats (one legged squats with your
other foot behind you on a chair or some other elevated surface…makes it hit
the hamstrings better) and the 3rd time I did tricep dips on the
bench.

I got this YOR (that’s the brand name) Super Greens
supplement from one of my coworkers. They’re a little pricey. The
first day I took them, I felt pretty good. I was tired before I took them
and after they kicked in, I felt perked up and energized. You can mix
them with anything, but the package recommends cold water. I mixed mine
that first day with my coffee and it was actually quite tasty. The coffee
was caramel macchiato flavored (the coffee, not the creamer…I don’t do flavored
creamers…they have sugar and are loaded with unnecessary calories) and when I
added the Super Greens, it gave it a kind of sweet, herbal taste. I
really liked it! Later in the first day, I mixed it with just plain
water…wanted to give myself a little bit of natural energy while I worked the
late night shift at work. The second day, I mixed them with my glutamine
and BCAA’s in water. It was pretty tasty!Couldn’t even really taste them over the flavor of the BCAA’s.

Last week, a LOT of people really started pointing out that
they noticed I have lost a significant amount of weight and that it is
definitely obvious. I said a sincere and chipper “thank you” to soooooo
many people because they all told me how great I was looking and congratulated
me on my weight loss. Then I told them that I’ve lost 30-something pounds
since the beginning of May and they’re just flabbergasted. Like,
seriously, their jaws dropped open and their eyes almost popped out of their
heads! I have to say, I was pretty astounded myself when I turned a
certain way and my oblique ab muscle just popped right out and said
“HELLO!” I was just like wow! I really wish I had pictures from when
I was training for bodybuilding (I never made it beyond like 4 months into the
training…I just couldn’t stick to the super strict and bland diet…I bet I could
now! But I don’t want to do that. That was what I wanted 11 years
ago. Now I’m a runner). Actually, I just wish I had pictures from
my 20’s and earlier 30’s. I just don’t have many pictures of myself from
beyond a few years ago when I first started trying to be serious about losing
weight.

One of my favorite races (last year was the inaugural
event), the South Padre Island Marathon just posted their A and B options for
this year’s medal. People can vote on it and they’ll then pick a
winner. I love both designs and would be very happy with either
one. One has one sandcastle on it that’s a little cartoonish (but like a
bronze color, like last year’s medal was bronzey) and the other has 2 sand
castles that look semi-professional-like (also bronze). I’m so excited
for this race!

I decided this past week to up a couple of my FitBit daily
goals.I changed my 10K steps a day to
15K steps a day and, while I didn’t hit that every day, I did hit it MOST
days.I also changed my floors of stairs
goal from 10 floors to 20!I do love
stairs.Also, I really wish FitBit would
make it so that you could manually add floors of stairs like you can steps,
miles, kilometers, swimming workouts, and such.It’s upsetting to me that you can’t add floors of stairs because FitBit doesn’t
recognize that you’ve gone up any floors at all when you’re on a stair climber
machine.

I think it’s high time to replace my Garmin GPS watch
again.It doesn’t seem to hold onto
charges (or maybe I’m an idiot that occasionally forgets to turn it off?).But, it does say it has a low battery and
dies when it still has between 12-22% battery left.And there is the 920XT that has a race
predictor that will help me stay on pace in races because it will show me in
what approximate time I will finish the race based on my pace thus far and my
pace at the moment that I check it.I had
this feature on the Polar M400 and that was pretty much the only thing I liked
about the Polar.So, I’m going to see if
I have the money available on my next paycheck to buy it.I will probably have to scrimp on a few
things, but I think I can afford it.

I got my new vacuum this past weekend.I assembled it and used it and I love
it.It’s actually not super loud.I can still hear the TV over it!I used both the floor head and the tube by
itself and both worked fantastic.I bought
the Shark Navigator Lift Away Deluxe.

So, being a fitness fanatic and a FitBit fanatic.And since I recently upped my daily step
goal, I’m always looking for ways to hit that step goal and just keep myself
moving, moving, moving as much as possible.A body in motion stays at motion and I don’t want to be that body at
rest that stays at rest because, to me, that’s just boring.Not saying I don’t take my times to chill and
relax, just saying, I like to stay busy.Anyway, off topic there.I like
to walk and run and do anything that gets me more steps.WALK ALL THE STEPS!!!So, that leads into…yes, I play Pokemon
Go.Not all seriously or anything and I’m
very inept at it, but I do enjoy finding new and fancy Pokemons and now that I’ve
learned what Pokestops are and how to use them, it’s a little more fun for me
as I ran out of balls the other day.

I’ve also decided that while I’m on vacation I will consume
as little caffeine as possible.So, I went
and bought decaf coffee and some caffeine free diet coke.I can’t be sure if how I felt on Sunday had
anything to do with caffeine withdrawals, but I’m pretty sure it was mostly due
to dehydration and having 2 alcoholic drinks when I usually have none.So, I’m sure there was a tiny bit of caffeine
withdrawal, but not much.I decided to
do this because I believe my body has become completely desensitized to
caffeine and I needed to take a step back from it for a little bit and this was
the perfect time to do it.usually when I
go on a vacation where I stay home, I at least cut back on caffeine if not
completely stop consuming it.

This week in food, we have green waffles (spinach & banana...you seriously can't taste the spinach), salmon burgers, watermelon, and lots of water!

I wanted to post some of the fitness and inspiration memes
that really impacted me this past week.I
might make this a regular part of this post.Nothing like ending a post with some positive memes, right?!?!